CE Turceni to spend €70 mln for carbon certificates

Company officials realized they are exceeding their certificates quota allocated by the National Allocation Plan. Thus, the company’s major shareholder, the National Authority for State Assets Recovery (AVAS), decided to change the revenues and expenditures budget.

According to market specialists, the price for an emission certificate is €35, so the energy complex will spend a total €70 million for exceeding the allocated quota. Company representatives were not available for comment.

Market sources recently told Business Standard that Romania’s major thermal plants producing energy based on coal could pay some €100-200 million to purchase extra emission certificates.

Turceni also exceeded its quota in 2007 and issued 6.8 million tons of carbon, 440,000 tons more than stipulated in the National Allocation Plan for CO2 emissions, according to data from the Environment Ministry.

The European Union decided to cut by 20 percent Romania’s carbon emissions quota for 2008-2012. This reduction is to impact on old thermal plants and energy prices. “With the [5 percent] electricity price hike as of July 1, we acknowledged the expenses budgeted by producers to buy emission certificates. The impact of those expenses in the total production costs is 3 percent,” according to the Vice-President for Energy within Romania’s Energy Regulatory Authority (ANRE), Nicolae Opris.

Turceni Energy Complex is the largest local thermal plant and supplies some 10 percent of the total electricity consumption countrywide. In the first half of 2008, the company posted €24.6 million in net income, double year-on-year, and turnover worth €161.9 million, some 23 percent higher year-on-year.